01 GETTING INVOLVED Levels of involvement

Explore Your Archive is an ongoing, annual campaign. It is owned by the sector, giving you freedom to use the campaign in support of any event that you may be planning at any time of the year.

Archives and record offices experienced in public outreach, advocacy and event promotion may not need much of the advice or accessories in this toolkit. But, as with everyone else, you have absolute flexibility to use the logos, branding and other items in this toolkit in support of your plans.

For those new to campaigning or with limited capacity to organise events, you may find it useful to aim for an activity in launch week, and the following menu of options helpful in choosing your ideal level of participation.

We know that many of you don’t have much resource and time, so here are different ways that you can get involved.

Many archives and record offices have said that they like to have an identified campaign launch week each year to help them sell ideas internally and plan activities as far in advance as possible. To date, launch week has taken place around the middle of November each year, and now over two consecutive weekends. Extensive efforts to find an ‘ideal’ week in the calendar that works for everyone have so far failed, so we have tended to stick to November. For those of you who choose this option, we focus the lion’s share of our annual public-facing campaign promotional activity (conventional media, social media, wider marketing, etc.) in the four weeks or so preceding launch week. Each region/nation of the UK and Ireland tends to have its own designated ‘launch event’ or series of events.

Easy level

- You could use your existing channels to let people know about the campaign e.g. include something on your website, in a newsletter or on social media about the Explore Your Archive campaign in the run up to the week
- You could use key messages and template press release to draft a press release to issue to your local/specialist media to let them know about the Explore Your Archive campaign

Medium level

- You could create a ‘Story Box’ – more on this on the following pages – and spread the word about this through your existing channels and through local/specialist media
- You could use your existing channels to let people know about the campaign e.g. include something on your website, in a newsletter or on social media about the Explore Your Archive campaign in the run up to the week
- You could use key messages and template press release to draft a press release to issue to your local/specialist media to let them know about the Explore Your Archive campaign

Highest level

- You could create a ‘Story Box’ – more on this on the following pages – and spread the word about this through your existing channels and through local/specialist media
- You could use your existing channels to let people know about the campaign e.g. include something on your website, in a newsletter or on social media about the Explore Your Archive campaign in the run up to the week
- You could use key messages and template press release to draft a press release to issue to your local/specialist media to let them know about the Explore Your Archive campaign
- You could engage with local groups, organisations and charities asking them to let people know about the campaign through their newsletters, groups etc and potentially taking your ‘Story Box’ to one of their gatherings if possible
- You could hold an event about your ‘Story Box’ Campaign toolkit

01 Getting involved

The other sections of this toolkit explain more about how you can do each of these, what we mean by ‘story boxes’ and guidance on how to go about some of the things we have suggested.

We’ve also created some handy downloadable resources to help you, including a template press release, ready-to-use posters, campaign logos in a variety of sizes and files to suit your digital, printing and poster needs, and a suggested timeline.

You can download resources for your campaign from the Explore Your Archive web pages.

### Campaign timeline

| Month | Potential Activity | |------------------------|-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------| | June — Early September | • Get internal buy in from other staff members and relevant teams | | | • For those with medium to high level involvement, you may want to start pulling together materials for your ‘Story Box’ (more on this later) and engaging with local/specialist ambassadors | | August — September | • Draft a press release/liaise with press team to get this written and approved | | | • For those getting involved at a higher level, start engage with local/specialist groups, organisations and charities about the campaign and what you’re doing | | October — November | • Issue your press release to local/specialist media | | | • Create/print posters or leaflets and use existing channels to raise awareness of the campaign and, if you are doing one, your event | | | • Hold an event around mid November |